


No Matter What

by temporalDecay



Series: distrait shorts [10]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-07
Updated: 2013-10-07
Packaged: 2017-12-28 18:41:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,720
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/995226
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/temporalDecay/pseuds/temporalDecay
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Nepeta Leijon is declared MIA, Equius Zahhak comes to Eridan Ampora for help and Eridan Ampora is genre savvy enough to recognize the plot of the movie they're reenacting. Includes alien worms, lots of snark, Gamzee Makara being fucking terrifying and Sollux Captor being a magnificent bastard.</p>
            </blockquote>





	No Matter What

**Author's Note:**

> I'd been meaning to finish this short for a while. 0w0 Also, more evidence that Sollux Captor is the biggest bag of writhing bulges in the history of ever.

TA: im 2orry  
TA: 2he2 off the griid  
TA: there2 liiterally nothiing ii can do now

  


* * *

  


“How,” you ask, looming over Eridan and too short on sleep and patience to be amused by the way he chokes on his drink, “ _the hell_ do you have the highest accuracy rating in the Empire.” 

He looks up at you with a mixture of exasperation and annoyance, coughing up the remnants of his coffee as he attempts to get his bearings. And then he seems to have processed your words, because his expression turns into one of dumstruck surprise. 

“You said hell,” he babbles, wasting precious, precious time which you do not have at the moment, “ _holy shit_.” 

“Eridan,” you say, sharp and stern, more of a growl than anything else. 

“Three hundred sweeps of loyal service to the Empire,” he snaps, almost on reflex. Then shrugs. “Admin work sucks and shooting things without getting yelled at makes it better. So long as it doesn’t bleed, no one gives me shit about it.” 

“I need a sniper,” you say, nodding in acceptance to that explanation and letting your mind realign the facts, “so it might as well be you.” 

You turn to leave, only to realize, as you stop by the door, that he’s not following. _He’s wasting time_ , and you feel half of your body twitch in annoyance at the fact. 

“What the fuck do you need a sniper for,” he demands, and his concern would be touching, if you had fucking time for it. “What are—“ 

“Nepeta is missing,” you say, short and hollow and to the point. Eridan clicks his mouth shut with an almost audible sound. “You will help me find her,” you order, with an authority you don’t really have, terrified of what could happen to your moirail, the longer you dillydally around, and terrified that Eridan will refuse to honor his vows now. 

He snorts, rolling his eyes and somehow managing to drain some of the tension off your spine. 

“ _Of course_ I’m going to help you find her,” he snaps, catching up with you with a resolute twist in his step, “you sweaty mountain of inbred stupid, someone outta make sure you don’t get your ass _culled_.” You don’t have words to properly answer to that, so you merely nod sharply and turn to the door again. Eridan matches your step, hooks his arm to yours and tugs you to his quarters instead. “We need a plan,” is all he offers as explanation. 

“I have a plan,” you snap, scowling at him and yourself and the fact you’re following because everything hurts and you want someone to take charge but no one can because it’s your moirail and it’s your job to save her, no matter what. 

“Exactly,” Eridan snorts, rolling his eyes with a flourish, “we need a plan that actually works, a.k.a., one made by _anyone_ but you.” 

You snarl but don’t argue with his logic, and if anyone thinks it’s odd to see you two stalking down the corridors, holding hands and fingers entwined, you can’t honestly say you care. You probably should, and will once the situation is under control. But then Nepeta will be safe and sound and she’ll just laugh and shoosh you until you stop caring so much. That’ll be nice. 

You don’t remember when you started holding his hand, but you don’t care, it’s solid and his grip is tight, and it’s keeping you anchored in reality. You cycle through panic and rage several times before Eridan pushes you into a plushy chair in his respiteblock. 

“Small words now, hon,” Eridan says, sitting on the edge of his desk and smiling wryly when you snarl a smile at him on reflex. “What’s going on?” 

You take a deep breath. Release it. _You’re wasting time_ , half of your mind screeches, but you trust Eridan to help. You probably shouldn’t, but your kismesis is nothing if not thorough. If he says he’ll help, he’ll help. And the more you protest, the more he’ll argue, and the more he argues the longer it’ll take to get your moirail back. You take another deep breath and sigh with a shudder. 

“She was investigating something or another in a lesser sector, I am not completely clear on the details, even though as her moirail it is my responsibility to look after her, but now she’s _gone_ and I—“ 

Eridan sits on your lap. Or perhaps plop would be a better term. Either way, he reaches out to press his thumbs on your temples and the rest of his fingers on your skull, and some of the tension leaves your body in a rush. 

“Facts and small words, hon,” he says, grinning that despicable grin of his that makes you throb with sheer hate, “I ain’t your moirail and I only care about your feelings in so much you’re an idiot for letting them fuck you over.” 

“Captor lost her near an abandoned moon post six shifts away from here,” you force yourself to say, and snarl some more when Eridan pushes the sunglasses up your hair, because now he can see how bloodshot your eyes are. “He thinks she should be there, or at least some clues of her whereabouts.” 

“What was your plan, then?” He asks, in past tense, because he’s not letting you do things your own way anymore, and you’re so _grateful_ and you hate him _so much_. 

“Get a high rank sniper for support, storm the place, get her back.” 

Easy, straightforward, uncomplicated. Eridan shakes his head. 

“Storm the place with what, the _Morrigan_?” He arches an eyebrow at you, and you want to punch him but he’s still massaging your temples and refusing to let you rage properly. “Six shifts don’t justify using a fucking _battle cruiser_.” 

“She’s my moirail,” you snarl, shoving him off your person sharply and perhaps a little harder than you intended. 

Eridan bounces off the floor a little, but snarls right back, eyes narrowed. 

“And you’re the fucking Captain of a considerable chunk of the fleet,” he says, pulling himself to his feet and looking very much like he’d like to hit you. You’re perturbed by how much you want him to hit you. “You can’t just drag your fucking flagship around into a personal mission when you have a job to do.” 

“She’s my _moirail_ ,” you insist, desperate to not admit he’s right because it feels like a betrayal and you can’t afford to even imagine betraying Nepeta. 

“And we’re gonna get her back,” Eridan assures you, with confidence you wish you felt, “but we’re also gonna make sure you have as few problems as possible, when you come back.” You whimper a little in the back of your throat and perhaps you really look as miserable as you feel, because he chooses not to mention it. “How’s the tinkering going on your warship project?” 

It takes you embarrassingly long to realize what he’s talking about. You frown. 

“With only a single pit installed, an extraordinarily strong Helmsman would be required to fly it,” you give him a dubious look, “I don’t think your moirail—“ 

“Zahhak,” he cuts you off, snorting and for a second giving you a feral look that makes you wonder if he’ll rip your throat out, “I hate you so much I could swear it’s serendipity.” You flush violently, choking on spit. Eridan goes on, mercilessly. “Even if it _were_ serendipity, I would still fucking kill you with my bony, useless hands, before even remotely considering putting my moirail anywhere near a pit again.” He leans in, until he’s nose to nose with you and you can see every tiny vein in his eyes. “Suggest that again and I will kill you _so hard_ not even Captor will be able to find the body.” 

“Right,” you say, for lack of anything else, but it makes Eridan pull away with a snort. “Even so—“ 

“I have an extraordinarily strong Helmsman in mind already,” he snaps, shaking a hand, “and he owes me, too, so that’ll work. Only condition is that you ought to keep your maw shut and never tell anyone ever about this,” you’re nodding already, even as he points to the ceiling with a thumb. “Even Captor’s agreed to keep it quiet.” 

“I can do that,” you resist the urge to bounce in your chair. “What about the rest?” 

You should be _moving_. Plan while you’re getting there. Six shifts is entirely too long and who knows what could happen while you waste time here? By the time you get there, it’ll be closer to nine. And Nepeta could be— 

“Do you even have assault gear that fits you?” 

You stare at him blankly. 

“I know you can punch a hole in a mountain, hon,” he rolls his eyes, voice slow and measured, “but you’re not impervious to damage and I’d imagine anything Leijon was scratching at will probably be really good at killing shit.” 

“I don’t,” you reply, quiet, slowly burying your face in your hands. 

“’s cool, I know someone who owes me,” he smirks, “the time it takes her to get it ready will give our Helmsman time to recharge. It all works out.” 

“Why do you know so many people who _owe_ you?” You demand, annoyed and irrational, and aware you’re being irrational but without any real incentive to stop. 

“Because I’m a _bureaucrat_ , not a fucking soldier; I’m better at collecting favors than goddamn heads,” Eridan answers, supremely nonplussed by your outburst. “Also fuck you, you don’t get to complain when it’s helping you.” He rolls his eyes and points a claw at his recuperacoon. “Now get in there, I’m gonna go yell at people, lie to my matesprit and my moirail to their faces and bully your Head Admin for a change. Get some fucking sleep.” 

“But—“ 

“You’re a fucking mess, Zahhak, and having you breathing down my neck and doing your fucking creepy looming thing in the background won’t get shit done.” He shoves you a little, and you try to remember when you even stood up at all and _can’t_. “Get some fucking sleep, I’ll wake you up when the show’s ready to hit the road.” 

“This isn’t—“ 

“ _Now_ ,” he shoves you again, harder this time. 

You frown down at him. 

“You—“ 

“Do I have to fuck you unconscious?” You splutter as he merely arches an eyebrow, as if discussing a perfectly reasonable plan of action. “Because I will so fuck you unconscious.” 

You know he can, has and will, if given an excuse. You stop arguing and instead choose to sulk in silence from the depths of his recuperacoon. 

You don’t remember falling asleep. 

  


* * *

  


If the situation were different, you would be quite scandalized at the sight of Arthur Imoogi, (potential) _future Lord Imoogi_ , lounging in the custom made pit you installed in the helmsblock of your pet warship. It is veritably obscene to see violet light crackle and run in volts from him into the thick biowires sucking greedily at the ports down his limbs and his spine. He’s not just a seadweller, no, _he’s a child of the Dragon_ , and you’re old enough now to know what that _means_. And yet he’s been branded like any other psionic, as if his blood and his name didn’t matter. 

He’s obnoxiously excited about the pit and the technology you’ve installed in it, rambling a little about the differences with standard Helmsman tech he’s used while you plug him in. You’ve never had a strong enough Helmsman to test this pit before, and a distant corner of your mind thinks you should be more worried about that than you are, but your need to find your moirail is so overwhelming you can barely process another emotion at the same time, much less more complicated thoughts. Imoogi goes mercifully silent as he interfaces with the ship itself, and proves himself to be just as strong as Eridan promised he’d be, by flinging you into space at least at four times the speed you imagined he would. His smile reminds you of Ximena’s, and as soon as you realize it, you decide not to think about him or Helmsmen or anything that could bring back memories, because you’re tired and nervous and furious and thinking about her will only make it _worse_. 

The situation isn’t different, anyway, and you are hardly in the right frame of mind to comment on it. 

"I think I’ve watched this movie," Eridan says, giving the main display a skeptical look as the floor plan of your destination rotates slowly in place. 

"Yeah, but hey," Imoogi echoes from the speakers, loud and cheerful and obnoxious, and you should, perhaps, be a lot more concerned about him than you are. "At least it’s not the _sequel_. The sequel was _terrible_.” 

"Shut up, Arthur,” Eridan deadpans, before you can come up with an adequate response. “Just keep doing your goddamn thing, okay?” 

"I think—" You begin, but are soon rudely interrupted, and then decide you’re not in the right frame of mind to entertain seadweller games. 

"Motherfucker, do you _want_ me to fly this ship or not?" Comes the smug retort, and the only reasonable thing you can do, at this point, is put your head in your hands and sigh. 

"I want you to fly the ship _and_ keep your goddamn lousy maw closed," Eridan grouses, rolling his eyes with flourish. "The grown-ups are talking." 

"One," Imoogi goes on, undeterred, "you _do_ remember I’m actually older than you, don’t you? Because that’s still a thing." Eridan snorts loudly, which telegraphs his feelings about that all too clearly. "And two, you two assholes start fucking and I fly us straight into a star, see if I don’t." 

"What," Eridan sneers, because he’s Eridan and he can’t help himself, "you mean _on purpose_ this time?" 

"You—" 

"If we may perhaps return to the matter at hand," you say, loudly and shrilly but you’re so exasperated you really don’t care anymore, "and focus on what’s important? Namely _, finding my moirail?_ ” 

“In the creepy abandoned moonbase that seems to have been pulled out of a horror flick, yeah,” Eridan snorts. “I know you want to just run in, punching heads off and all, but we should probably fine tune details. The most important thing is turning on central power and rebooting the main control core.” 

You scowl. 

“Nepeta is the most important thing,” you hiss, teeth tightly clenched. 

Eridan reaches on the tip of his toes and stretching his arm, until he flicks his claws against the base of your broken horn. Sparks rain down your spine and your eyes cloud for a moment. You find yourself slumped on the chair, when the mental fog clears up a little. He’s sitting on the edge of a control panel, looking unbearably smug, when you look at him. 

“If we power up the base,” he says, in a tone one would use to speak with a dimwitted grub, “we’ll plop it right back into Captor’s awareness.” There’s a significant pause there, as if you’re expected to say something, but there’s nothing you can think of. Eridan sighs and looks at the ceiling, as if asking it for patience. “Once it’s back in his awareness, he can find Nepeta in seconds and save us possibly hours of blind searching.” 

“I _know_ that,” you snarl, defensive. 

“Don’t fucking snarl at me,” he snorts, kicking lightly at your knee. “I’m your fucking kismesis, it’s my job to fucking remind you of shit you know and keep forgetting because you’re a hopeless idiot without your moirail.” 

You open your mouth. Close it. Release a breath through your nose. 

“My apologies,” you mutter, slouching back into the chair. 

“’s cool,” Eridan sighs, and then slides in to flop into your lap. 

“ _Flying us into a star_ ,” Imoogi’s voice snarls from all around you, embarrassingly high pitched. 

Eridan raises an arm above your heads and flips the closest camera the finger before you can react. With nothing else to do, you bury desperate laughter into his neck and hold onto him as tightly as you dare. 

  


* * *

  


Imoogi makes exceedingly good time to your destination, and as soon as you and Eridan are geared up, he seals up the Helmsblock and goes to sleep. Only then it occurs to you that, no matter how strong he is, the strain he must have been under was no scoffing matter. You look down at the armored plates of the assault gear Eridan got you with something almost like disdain. This is a foot soldier’s garb, something you never, not even in your most ridiculous daydreams, thought you’d be wearing. You find yourself personally offended by the fact it’s anonymous dark grey, without even a hint of your color in it. A few feet away, wearing an equally faceless suit, Eridan is bouncing in place, like a runner warming up before a race. 

“Fucked up gravity,” he says, voice slightly muffled by the helmet currently allowing him to breathe the depleted atmosphere of the moon, “ _joy_.” 

You hadn’t even consciously noticed and you find yourself annoyed with your own lack of perception for basic details. You need to put your head into this now, you can’t afford to fail your moirail. 

“Will it be a problem?” You ask, fists clenching and unclenching repeatedly, testing the durability of the gloves, though you were told the entire armor should theoretically withstand your strength and pretty much anything thrown at you during this little sojourn. 

“Lesser evil,” Eridan snorts, shaking his head. “The bigger evil is something Captor and I decided it was best not to tell you until we got here, because we think it’ll be more useful for you to freak out here, than while we were stuck in a tiny fucking metal box of a ship.” You brace yourself. “This base was abandoned and decommissioned for a reason.” 

“I would imagine so,” you snap, looming at him with a scowl he can’t see. 

“Right,” he shrugs, “this used to be a tankworm breeding facility.” He swallows hard. “There was an _incident_.” 

You let that sink in a moment. 

“ _Fuck_.” 

Eridan laughs shrilly, pulling out a sniper rifle from his sylladex. 

“Yeah,” he nods. “So watch your step. I’ve got your back.” 

He does and you don’t doubt him. As soon as you approach the perimeter of the building, there are larvae everywhere and while it takes nearly no effort for you to crush them, Eridan keeps his distance and proves his accuracy record was not a mistake by picking up the ones aiming for your back. The worms are barely the size of your arm, grotesquely thick and slimy, a pallid pink that sits uncomfortably in your gut when you squish them, because their blood is the same hue. You make your way into the complex like that, walking briskly forward while Eridan whines and bitches through the communicator about this or that thing you missed that nearly killed you. You don’t care. Turning the power back on is laughably easy for someone like you. Eridan finds himself a nice, cozy spot near the ceiling of the generators block, pressing his back into a corner and following you around with the scope of his rifle as you work. It gets increasingly harder to keep calm enough to control yourself and not smash the control panels as you work. It’s easy work, but not fast enough to your liking, and you end up pacing the length of the block as the old generators groan back into action. After what feels like an eternity, the lights blare into being, and you blink back tears as your eyes try to adjust. 

You take one moment to smile in satisfaction, and end up on the floor as the ground shakes viciously. 

“I think we got company,” Eridan squeaks from his corner, laughing weakly as he lets himself fall to the ground. 

“Yes,” you say, smiling with grim satisfaction. “It would seem we do.” 

Though you can’t see his face, you can imagine Eridan’s expression perfectly as he tilts his head to the side. You probably sound entirely too happy about the prospect of facing whatever is large enough to cause that disturbance, but in truth you desperately need to punch something. With an almost feral smirk, you stalk out the doorway back into the courtyard, intent on heading for the main building as soon as possible. 

The ground explodes some ten feet away from you, rocks flying as an enormous and decidedly adult version of the worms forces its way to the surface. Eridan shrieks in the back of his throat as the monstrous thing roars silently, baring a circular maw full of sharp teeth strong enough to tear through rock. You’ve never seen a tankworm from up close before, and you find your mind wandering back to old schoolfeeding as you roll away to avoid getting chomped in half by the thing. Eridan rains bullets on its hide, but they bounce off harmlessly. Of course they do. Centuries ago – and something inside you twitches when you realize it _has_ been centuries now – when Her Imperious Condescension still sat at the throne of the Empire, tankworms were bred and implanted with biotechnology in thousands of facilities just like this one. The alien creatures, relics of an ancient conquest, used to serve as the main extermination tool for planets whose populations or resources were deemed unnecessary. 

You punch a hole in the hide of the beast, feeling insane laughter bubbling in your gut as it writhes and thrashes about. You punch it again, out of range for its terrifying jaws, again and again until your arms are covered up to the elbow in that same pinkish gore. The tankworm whines as it falls over, dead. 

“Oh fuck,” Eridan whimpers, as two more erupt around you. 

You’re laughing, by the third successive wave, the suit splattered from head to toes in guts and blood. Eridan is perched atop a railing of a nearby building, hanging off precariously as he shoots the creatures eyes and open mouths, crippling them for you to make short work of. You’re assaulted by the rather uncharacteristic thought that, once this is over, you want to bend him over the nearest solid surface and fuck him until he cries. 

Then you find yourself pierced by guilt for finding enjoyment in this, when your moirail is still unaccounted for. You tear open a tankworm by the jaw, splitting the creature in two torn halves, and stomp towards the main complex again. 

You don’t have time for this. 

  


* * *

  


“What kind of company?” Eridan asks, as you leave behind the courtyard, now scattered with countless tankworm corpses. “Helpful company or company that wants us dead?” 

It takes a moment to realize Captor’s obnoxious yellow text is at the bottom of your HUD, where, if you were an actual soldier and not a troll on a serendipity given mission, your orders would be display, directly from your command station. _Yes_ , it says and you wish you had seen the rest of the conversation. It’s never a good sign, when Captor is short on words. 

“Have you found her yet?” You demand, interrupting Eridan’s rather unbecoming, nervous squawks. 

_Marked it in the map_ , Captor’s words appear on the HUD, _let Eridan guide you there_. Eridan mutters something rude and shakes his head, trading the sniper rifle for something that looks very much like a shotgun. You tilt your head to the side for a moment, then start following. He looks nervous and jittery as he walks ahead of you, but also resolute. You wonder if he scared, then feel a strange ping of warmth when you realize he’s not scared enough to not be here. It’s almost nice. 

Then you round a corner and come face first with a surprised looking troll. 

Eridan shoots his head off, pointblank, without skipping a beat. 

The dubious contents of his pan are now smeared down the corridor. A blueblood, you notice absently. Eridan stands there shaking for a moment, before snapping out of it and storming forward with long, purposeful strides. 

“You must really stop this compulsion of yours,” you drawl, as quietly as you can, “of shooting people pointblank in the face around me.” 

He doesn’t stop, though, his only acknowledgement to your words being the rude gesture he throws you over his shoulder. 

Eridan is disturbingly proficient at sneaking up on people and shooting them in the head. After the third time, you realize his HUD probably has a map to guide him and feel slightly irritated by the fact. Though considering how scattered your thoughts are, it’s probably for the best. Still, you punch holes in a few trolls to make yourself feel better. 

All your thoughts, however, die painful, abrupt deaths, when you tear open the door of a containment cell and find your moirail curled up in a corner over a considerable puddle of blood. 

“Get her out,” you say, voice murderously calm as you turn on your heel, “I will meet you back at the ship.” 

You don’t stick around to hear Eridan’s reply, you have an unknown number of people to murder and no real desire to reign yourself in any longer. 

  


* * *

  


“Now that ain’t something a brother be getting his gaze on very often,” a very familiar voice purrs as every hair in the back of your neck stands on end. 

You’re sitting on a pile of rubble, trying to catch your breath after actually, genuinely exerting yourself for the first time in forever. All around you, walls are collapsed and torn apart corpses are strewn on the floor. Your rather unsubtle tactics got the alarms roaring almost at once, which worked in your favor because it made the remaining trolls in the base come out of hiding to find you. 

“It’s a motherfucking filthy crime,” the Grand Highblood drawls, stepping into the dim lights and towering above you with terrifying ease, “to deny the faithful their godly given prey.” 

You never did like Gamzee as much as you thought you should. Too sloppy, too crass, too graceless. And then something happened, sweeps and sweeps ago, when he clubbed Vriska’s lusus to death and howled laughing as he stood amidst the corpse. Something happened, that gave him the confidence and the power to stand up and claim—no, _demand_ his Ancestor’s title. The troll standing before you, clad in black, purple and the bones of his most notable kills, he’s not the same boy who’d pester you every so often with ridiculous, nonsensical comments about nothing in particular. The troll standing before you, club at the ready and greasepaint twisting his already gruesome expression into something vile, is everything a troll of his station is meant to be. 

You stare up at him, wondering if he’s going to kill you. 

You think he would and you don’t think you’d stop him, if he tried. 

The moment stretches until it breaks, and Gamzee throws his head back, laughing in loud guffaws. 

“I all up and be knowing what it’s like,” he says, offering a hand, which you take only after a second of hesitation. He pulls you up to his feet with a grin. “Serendipitous pale, ain’t it, motherfucker? Ought to take good care of it.” He throws an arm down your shoulders, perhaps the only troll you’ve ever known who’s tall enough to do so, and tugs you along to the corridor where he came from. “Besides, a mirthful motherfucker like myself can have himself a pious massacre any which night he feels like it,” he purrs, in a tone that makes your skin prickle, “but watching a brother get his righteous fury on like this? It’s almost as if you’re one of my motherfucking ilk, Captain Zahhak.” 

“I’m not,” you say, mouth dry and reality crashing over your head, as the adrenaline and the anger fade from your system. “My Lord.” 

“Pity that,” Gamzee snorts, and shoves you into the courtyard, where you find a circle of Subjugglators surrounding Eridan, who still has your unconscious moirail in his arms. “Now let’s sort shit out.” 

All you really want is to curl around Nepeta and be lulled to sleep by the sound of her breathing. Instead, you straighten your back and nod grimly. 

  


* * *

  


“It wasn’t that bad,” Nepeta says, as you finger the gash on her thigh over and over again. “I got my prey, anyway,” she snorts, flexing her fingers as satisfaction pulls her lips into a grin. “It was just livelier than expected. I’d have gotten out on my own eventually,” she assures you, reaching out to hold your hand and entwine her fingers with yours, “I’m sorry I made you worry.” 

The quarters you’ve been given, aboard the _Messiah_ , are rather spacious. Larger and nicer than the ones Eridan was offered, at any rate. Imoogi stayed in the Helmsblock, and when Eridan saw fit to lie to Gamzee about him, you said nothing to contradict his story. Anything the seadwellers are worried about can’t harm them while Imoogi’s still hooked up, considering he has complete control of the warship where he is. Eridan refuses to step out of the tiny warship and onto the _Messiah_ , but considering his relationship with his matesprit’s moirail, you can’t say you really blame him. 

You wonder if it’s bad of you to not care about it, about Eridan’s fears or Imoogi’s ploys or Gamzee’s laughter or the politics of the whole thing, because Nepeta is safe and sound and healing. Your moirail is okay and the rest of the world can go fuck itself, for all you care. 

“Don’t cry, silly,” she says, combing her fingers through your hair and reaching out to kiss your forehead, “I’m right here, Equius.” 

You break down sobbing, then, stress and fear and everything crashing on your mind after the hellish past nights. Nepeta tugs you closer and purrs as you cry, and you rest your ear on her chest so you can hear her bloodpusher thump, strong and tireless and _alive_. 

“Pale for you,” you whisper, when you’ve calmed down enough to be able to speak again, pressing the words against the skin of her throat, “moon pale, cloud pale, sworn in blood and steel.” 

Nepeta takes your face in her hands and nudges it up so you’re almost nose to nose. 

“Pale for you,” she says, serene and _strong_ , and your entire being quivers when she leans in to brush her lips on your forehead, “moon pale,” and then she kisses your right cheek, “cloud pale,” and then the left one, “sworn in blood and steel.” 

She presses the most delicate, chaste kiss to your lips, and you melt into her again, letting your body fall over hers like a blanket. Only then, you feel sanity slowly begin to return to you. 

  


* * *

  


“Thank you,” you say, when Eridan slumps into a chair in your quarters. 

The _Messiah_ delivered you four to the _Morrigan_ without incident, and now all that is left is for you to catch up with the _Leviathan_ and return both seadwellers to their posts. Given Eridan’s body language, his conversation with his other quadrantmates wasn’t exactly _cordial_. 

“Fuck you,” he snaps, glowering at you from behind his fingers. “I didn’t do you a fucking _favor_ , you don’t get to thank me.” 

“I can appreciate your willingness to support me,” you snap back, as haughty as you can manage, which is a lot and makes you feel infinitely more like yourself. “You had no obligation to—“ 

“In the last few nights,” Eridan interrupts mercilessly, “I have murdered more people than in the past fucking century. I have lied to my moirail, my matesprit and _the fucking Grand Highblood_. I’ve cashed in more than sixteen different favors and single handedly shot down a fucking feral tankworm, aside the literal dozens I shot blind so you could punch holes into them.” 

“You took down a tankworm on your own?” You find yourself asking, head tilted to the side. 

“Fuck you for not having noticed, it was the crowning moment of awesome of my goddamn _life_ ,” Eridan looks unbearably smug for a moment, before sinking back into the chair, expression angry once more. “But yeah, I basically turned myself into a shitty sidekick in really bad action flick for your sake, for the past few nights.” You keep a steel paperweight with your sign engraved on it on your desk. Eridan throws it at your head with accuracy that no longer surprises you. You don’t really feel it bouncing off your forehead. “And I’ll do it all over again, if you need me to, just say the word. But if you ever imply again that me acting the fucking part of being your actual kismesis is somehow noteworthy, I’m going to dump your stupid fucking ass and go back to fucking strangers in bars. At least those jerks won’t imply I’m too fucking stupid or unreliable to be a decent quadrantmate, you fucking sh—“ 

He doesn’t really mind when you kiss him. 

“Pitch for you,” you mutter against his mouth, shivering when he digs in his claws into your scalp. 

“Fuck you,” he snarls, clinging to you for his dear life. 

You decide to show your gratitude in a different way, one you know he won’t object to. 

  


* * *

  


arsenicCatnip [AC] began trolling twinArmageddons [TA]

AC: just so were clear  
AC: if you ever use me to manipulate my moirail or my kismesis again, i will put your head on my fucking trophy wall  
TA: warniing duly noted  
TA: though ii feel the need two poiint out iit wa2 nece22ary  
AC: i dont care  
AC: i could have blown up the entire fucking moon into itty bitty chunks in half a perigee on my own  
TA: and ii would have gladly let you do thiings your way, np  
TA: but we diidnt have half a perigee  
AC: do they know  
TA: nah  
TA: a2 far a2 they know iit wa2 all about rescuiing you  
AC: fine  
AC: the warning still stands

arsenicCatnip [AC] ceased trolling twinArmageddons [TA]

TA: no one appreciiate2 the geniiu2 of a well-executed plan anymore

**Author's Note:**

> Things that let you know you've fucked up enough your life expectancy is audibly dropping with each second: Nepeta Leijon drops her typing quirk.
> 
>  
> 
> [Askblog for this verse.](http://requisitionforms.tumblr.com)


End file.
